Israeli researchers developed an early detection method for concussions, the Tower reports. The method, which uses magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), could allow doctors to more easily visualize and assess the consequences of injuries to the brain, including minor injuries.
The development could prove useful in examining concussions to football players, which is a growing concern in the United States.
According to the Tower:
Dr. Alon Friedman and his team at the Brain Imaging Research Center at Israel’s Ben Gurion University of the Negev and its affiliated Soroka University Medical Center in Beersheva showed, for the first time, how they were able to identify significant damage to the blood-brain barrier (BBB) of football players following "unreported" trauma or mild concussions. The method uses dynamic contrast-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging (DCE-MRI) to detect and localize vascular pathology and BBB breakdown. The BBB is composed of proteins, membranes and other materials that protect the brain by preventing many dangerous substances from penetrating. Medical researchers, including Friedman’s group at BGU, are working to find ways to develop drugs that could repair a damaged BBB and possibly prevent Alzheimer’s disease and other neurological diseases in some patients.
Forty percent of the examined football players with unreported concussions had evidence of "leaky BBB" compared to 8.3 percent of the control athletes. Published in the current issue of JAMA Neurology, this study could help physicians in the decision-making process regarding treatment and when an athlete may return to the playing field. Other members of the research team include BGU Ph.D. candidates Itai Weissberg and Ronel Veksler, who developed the new imaging method. Lyn Kamintsky, Rotem Saar-Ashkenazy and Dan Z. Milkovsky conducted the study. Dr. Ilan Shelef, BGU lecturer and a member of the department of medical imaging at Soroka University Medical Center, also contributed. The publication of this study follows closely on the heels of Tel Aviv University study showing that an enhanced environment could speed the healing of traumatic brain injuries.